I know very few writers who outline fully before they start. It just doesn't seem possible to do, because so many things don't come out until you're absolutely knee-deep in the world.

It's like the human race has been programmed for misery.

Once you'd broken through that invisible barrier that separates one person from another, you were connected forever, whether you liked it or not.

Back then, when everybody thought the world would last forever, nobody had time for anything.

I was also known as Frodo because I was an early adopter of 'The Lord of the Rings.

I was writing very early, like I was involved in our high school literary magazine, which was called 'Pariah.' The football team was the Bears, and the literary magazine was 'Pariah.' It was great. It was definitely a real sub-culture. But I wrote stories for them.

Maybe that's what we look for in the people we love, the spark of unhappiness we think we know how to extinguish.